Wallkill baseball doomed by brutal third inning

SAUGERTIES — Take away a nightmare of a third inning and Joe Pillitteri and the Wallkill defense played brilliant baseball in a state Class A opening-round game Friday.

William Montgomery

SAUGERTIES — Take away a nightmare of a third inning and Joe Pillitteri and the Wallkill defense played brilliant baseball in a state Class A opening-round game Friday.

Rye, the Section 1 champion, made a big third inning count.

With five hits and a pair of errors by the Wallkill defense, Rye struck for five runs in the third en route to a 6-1 victory at Cantine Field.

Wallkill starter Pillitteri, who threw 99 pitches over six innings, allowed five hits, striking out three, walking two and hitting two batters.

Subtract that third inning from Pillitteri's line and he pitched five no-hit innings for Wallkill, but Rye's big inning made all the difference in the game.

"I have to be able to get out of things like that," said Pillitteri, a senior right-hander. "You make an error or two in the inning and I give up a couple of hits, that's baseball. I credit everybody behind me, they played their butts off. I just gave it what I could after that. I didn't want it to get too out of control. Kudos to them, they're a great team and we never stopped fighting."

Rye's Tim Hale led off the third with an eight-pitch walk. The next batter, Jay Little, laid down a sacrifice bunt toward third base, but Pillitteri's throw to first sailed long, allowing Hale to take third.

Tim DeGraw, Rye's leadoff hitter, followed with a two-run double to right center. Griffin Tutun, Brendan Tripodi and Sam Lubeck followed with back-to-back-to-back RBI hits.

"I was trying to give my team a chance at that point, letting them put the ball in play," Pillitteri said. "We tried our best. You know, sometimes you don't win them."

Wallkill junior shortstop Nick Gomez led off the fourth with a single and he came around to score on an RBI groundout by senior right fielder Nick Pacifico.

Rye senior left-hander Luke Meyerson went the distance, striking out seven and holding Wallkill to three hits. All three of Wallkill's hits came in the fourth inning.

Meyerson was perfect through the first three innings and also set down Wallkill batters in order in the fifth and seventh innings.

"He was crafty," said Pillitteri, who went 1-for-3 as Wallkill's cleanup hitter. "He had a nice curveball and he hit you with the changeup. He had a sneaky fastball. He wasn't throwing slow. He's a good pitcher and he located his pitches."

For Wallkill (17-6), it was still the best season in program history, as the Panthers won a Section 9 title for the first time. Wallkill had previously lost in Section 9 championship games in 1996 and 1974.

"It's unbelievable," Pillitteri said. "This group has been together since we were 5 or 6 years old. We brought home a section championship and no one can take that away from us. I think we lost to a great team in the state tournament, so it was a great season for Wallkill."